Not This Time
by A Star In My Universe
Summary: Nicky Nichols isn't like the other inmates to Joel Luschek. There's something about that smirk, wild hair, and careless attitude that always pulls him in. He doesn't know how the messed up lesbian junkie has managed it, but equally he doesn't know how he'll manage when she's sent to max.
1. Chapter 1

Luschek rubbed the back of his neck agitatedly as Donaldson rifled through his desk. Caputo stood over him, the little power he possessed allowing this shit show to commence. Whatever was in there, questionable as it may be, there wouldn't be fucking _drugs._ He wasn't that clueless, he'd never been that desperate. Desperate enough to hide it in the most obvious place, to not care about the repercussions of them finding it…

 _Desperate._

The word jolts him. His head snapped up to the inmates in an instant and he's hit by her face. Two pairs of eyes met across the claustrophobic room. His were hardened by the regime, weathered by drug use and just general stupidity, and crinkled in concern. Hers were wild, darting, and widening more every time Donaldson's fingers brushed over the drawer of his desk.

If there was one word he would use to describe Nicky, it was desperate. Desperate for drugs, desperate for sex, desperate for love…it wasn't a bad thing, just human nature that sometimes she let him see, if he was lucky enough to catch her at the right time. If there was another word, it would be reckless. And this was just the kind of stunt she would pull.

"Ah, found something. Looks like…coke." Donaldson produced a small packet of white powder. Luschek watched, his stomach knotting, as he examined the baggie. "No…it's heroin. Plus, gum."

Nichols and her _fucking gum._ Luschek's heart pounded beneath his constricting CO uniform. How many times had he threatened her with a shot for chewing gum? Every time she came up to him, her mouth so close to him as she whispered her dirty jokes and the smell of mint wafting under his nose, he'd remind her that chewing gum was contraband. And she'd remind him that " _so is fucking weed",_ her lips quirking up into a smirk. He pressed his lips together and exhaled heavily, wondering how the hell he was going to keep her out of trouble this time.

When she'd shorted the whole kitchen electrical system by absentmindedly chatting to Red whilst fiddling with wires, lucky not to have been shocked as she leaned casually off of her ladder, he'd told Caputo that there must have been a leak. Dinner was an hour late, Sister Ingalls' blood sugar had dropped and Caputo was pissed, but she was still there the next morning to keep him company as he reeled off his ridiculous orders for the inmates, offering him a laugh as he asked them if they'd try not to cause chaos to the whole day's timetable today.

When cigarettes had swept through the prison and she was almost caught showing him how to light one with a battery, he'd burnt the inside of his pocket as he hid it in his jeans, shoving it out of sight. He swore as the smell of singed denim wafted in the air and she'd laughed in his face, her smile enough to bring him out of his semi-permanent bad mood and allowing her to escape a shot. Infrequently, but often enough, Nicky wondered if Luschek himself suffered from his so called "red dot special", his moods so volatile and switching so quickly.

But this time? This time, Luschek was sure, the guilt weighing heavily on his chest, this time there was no escaping the consequences. Panic was setting in on her features and his palms were sweaty. Nicky's hands gripped the work bench as he argued with Caputo. Her eyes were desperate and he was _so fucking angry._ The one inmate he thought it could trust, the one he actually enjoyed to be around.

He should have never trusted her. Okay, he thought, his mind and body buzzing with adrenaline, that much should've been obvious from the start. But for this, she could be sent to the SHU. Max. Anywhere. That was never his endgame plan when he made his money making plan with her. All he wanted was easy money and a partner in crime. One in prison might have been a bad choice, but he didn't want to wreck her whole life with a single mistake. He was fine with her selling it. Fine with her getting him to sell it. Using it, though, was a whole other game. His mouth was working ahead of his mind as he yelled, his temper getting the better of him. "It's her! She's the fucking junkie."

His finger points to Nicky. Her defences are immediately up – when aren't they? – and she's denying it. Chapman is watching him, her face a picture of pure, undisguised disgust, but she doesn't know Nichols like he does. His hand shook as he pointed at her, but he wouldn't regret ratting her out for something she did, he swears ( _so why does he wanna throw up?)._ He's biting the inside of his cheek and the blood that hits his tongue, warm and metallic, makes him want something to drink, preferably something strong. Her head is shaking in denial, her beautiful – _beautiful?_ – hair even messier than usual flying around everywhere as she vehemently denied his claims.

Any. Other. Inmate.

Why couldn't it have been any other fucking inmate?

The betrayal on her face hits him like a punch to the stomach and he instantly regrets the words that spilled from his mouth in anger. What was it about Nichols? Nicky Nichols. Even her name was intriguing when it shouldn't be. Those brown eyes dart from Caputo to his face.

The first time he met her, she was still detoxing. An angry Russian who had decided to play mommy kept her close and gave her treats that they assumed the COs didn't know about, her hair was even more wild than it is now, and she didn't know what the hell a fuse was, let alone how to fix a lamp. She shadowed the weird mob "family" who ruled the kitchen and somehow managed to worm her way into the top of the hierarchy without lifting a finger.

He'd barked an order at her while her head lolled on the workbench, the rings under her eyes blackening further with every waking moment. A broken lamp sat in front of her, looking as broken and sad as she was. "Work on that until when you flip the switch, the light turns on."

She had rolled her eyes and looked up. After a moment of staring at him, she flipped him off. "That's the only thing I'll be flipping this afternoon, asshole."

There was whoops and cheers from other inmates, repressed but too scared to say anything about it. And maybe if it wasn't her, she should have been afraid. Instead, he just smirked at her.

"What a fiery newt we have here." She hadn't even bothered to reply to him, her patience having long run out.

Yet somehow, when all of the other inmates had failed to even catch his eye, she had captured his entire attention. He didn't know why and he didn't know how, but he found himself enamored by the messed up lesbian junkie. When Pornstache had joked about him being gay when he failed to spend any time with the inmates in the broom closets, he'd been watching her stabbing a hole into the wall with her screwdriver. It wasn't love, he told himself; fuck, he didn't even know what _love_ was. And if it _was_ love, would God be as cruel to pair him up with not only a lesbian, but a drug addicted, sex crazed, messed up who had a predilection for hitting the self-destruct button? Someone who would never love him, might not even like him, back? He never prayed, he thought, but surely not.

It didn't make sense but none of it ever did. God, he felt so sappy when he looked at her, and it made him feel like such as ass when he couldn't stop that smile from creeping on his face when he glanced at her, making his day bearable without even meaning to.

And now she was staring at him like he was the worst person in the entire world, and he knew damn well that she'd met some pretty fucking awful people.

"Alright," Caputo relented. He'll never forget the fear that flashed on her face in that moment, the fear of the unknown overriding her fear of being seen as weak by the other inmates and COs. Her mouth was ajar as she attempted to find the words in her empty protests and her forehead was creased as she tried to fathom what had just happened; what he had just thrown her into. "Take her out, down the hill."

Down the hill.

The words made his knees buckle and she immediately started stammering, her face a mixture of confused, terrified and anger. "What?" Nicky asked, the already gravelly voice that he'd learnt like a song breaking in her anguish. He covered his face with his hands, not wanting to see anymore. "What the fuck is happening?" Following orders, the other COs take her arms and begin to drag her away, despite her physical and vocal protests that continued. "Wait! Mr Caputo!"

Luschek's fists ball up by his sides as he fights the urge to apologise for screwing things up, even if she was the one who had made sure they were caught. Her cries get louder and more desperate. "Mr Caputo! Fuck! Wait! Wait!" Every ounce of his strength was taken up by watching her stoically. He watched Mr Caputo, resigned, as he turned to face the other inmates.

"We will not tolerate this!" His voice bellowed but, to him, it was drowned out by Nicky's yells for help in the background that he was once again forced to ignore. Chapman's eyes bored into him but he faced the front, watching Mr Caputo. "You bring drugs in here, you will suffer the consequences!" As he finished, he turned to face Luschek. The words were clearly aimed at him, and he shrugged, scoffing.

 _Suffer the consequences._

He scoffed again. With Nichols, wasn't it always suffering?

When Caputo left, his power trip seeming to have lost its sparkle for him, Luschek sank down at his desk, ignoring stares from the other inmates who were shocked into an unusual silence. "Let this be a lesson to all of you! Drugs destroy lives." Luschek sat miserably, staring at the spot where she stood just a few minutes ago.

 _Drugs destroy lives._

As he stared at her seat, his eyes swivelling to the memories he had of her all around the room, he wondered with a sigh whose life exactly those drugs would destroy.

 **So this is a bit different to what I usually write, but I am really intrigued by the relationship between Nicky and Luschek and wanted to kind of get into his head. Now, I don't know how well I did on that front but I hope you enjoyed it nonetheless! For now, it's just a oneshot but I might extend it in the future, not sure.**

 **Please tell me what you think!**


	2. Chapter 2

How long had it been? He counted the days on his fingers, and sighed when he ran out of fingers to count on. He'd stopped writing notches on the wall when Watson had questioned why he was scratching holes into the already weak infrastructure. Ironically enough, it wasn't the prisoner wondering when this hell would end. Luschek squinted at the calendar on his desk that Caputo had provided to all of the employees and ran his finger along the weeks wearily.

A month.

It had been one whole month since Nichols had been sent away, and he still kicked himself for it. Kicked himself and the trash can he passed every day when he saw her "art work" hole in the wall, kicked the desks that she had stared at him unconsciously from, kicked every fucking thing that dared to remind him what he'd done.

No, fuck that - it wasn't his fault. He wasn't the one who put the drugs in the drawer, he wasn't the high asshole who introduced her to drugs to begin with (just the one who ruined her life further from behind bars), and he wasn't the one who forced her to hit self destruct whenever it was in her line of vision. He didn't - and, he suspected, no-one else did either - know what made her try and mess up her life at every given opportunity. He'd seen the Russian one, Red, he'd seen her pleading with Nicky. He'd heard the conversations from the paper thin bathroom walls, the way Red's voice wavered as she begged for Nicky's life as if she was being held hostage whilst the whole time Nichols was the one holding the proverbial knife. He'd seen the way Morello's eyebrows twitched up as Nicky's hands shook in the cafeteria, the way she had fallen apart without Nicky to hold her up.

He hadn't only messed up her life - although that's where his guilt weighed most heavily - he'd robbed a mother of a child, and by God had he seen the effect it had had on the matriarch, slower and heavier without her daughter, and he'd robbed - well, whatever Nichols and Morello were to each other. And he was reminded of that sick fact every time he had duty in the cafeteria, having to listen to Morello's sobs as Red comforted her, her own tears saved for when she bunked down at night, when he'd have to face reality all over again as the cries echoed in the silent room.

If that didn't make the crushing weight of guilt unbearable, then the rumors he'd heard from down the hill certainly did. When he'd inquired (against his better judgement), he had hoped that it would make him feel better, somehow convincing himself that she would flourish away from all the temptations. But no - he'd heard from a reliable source that down the hill was even worse for drugs than up the hill was, and his forehead wrinkled as he thought of Nichols doing whatever she could, whatever that would be (and he shuddered thinking about it, for his and her sake) to get the drugs she would always crave. She wasn't perfect. She was just as fucked up as everyone else was, more so in some people's eyes, but for some reason she was mostly exempt from his scorn and the thought of her out of her head on whatever she could get ahold of made him wince as if he was in actual physical pain.

If the constant reminders around the prison weren't enough, the hate mail he received from her regularly certainly were. He didn't need reminding that he was a monumental fuck up - his father reminded him often enough, and the fact that he came to a prison voluntarily each and every day proved to himself how empty his life had become. Still, seeing the words in ink stung somewhat, and he wondered how much time and energy Nichols spent on hating him. If it dented the amount of time he spent wondering about her. He doubted it.

He never worked out why she broke his apathetic frame of mind about, well, just about everything, but somehow she did. It pissed him off to no end, but she got under his skin. Maybe that's why he decided to visit her, because fuck knows why else he would chose to. He didn't know what convinced him to. He didn't think that it would make things better - or maybe, deep down, he hoped it would, somehow - but regardless, he strode confidently into that building and signed his name off without a hitch.

Maybe it was bravado. Or adrenaline. Maybe it was selfishness on his part. Or maybe he really was just a piece of shit.

But as he sat on the hard metal seat, it was the sound of her voice that grounded him. "Hey, I'm telling you. You made a mistake. I don't get visitors." It was the first shimmer of hope that she would be just like she always was, just as brash, just as obnoxious as she always was. She stared down at him, her mouth twisting into a smirk. And then she laughed.

He laughed too, an uncomfortable, awkward laugh. It spilled out from his mouth before he really thought what it could look like. She sat down slowly, methodically. Like the way Red someone shuffles cards. Her movements were deliberate, but unpredictable. His hands gripped the phone to his ear as he pointed for her to do the same. Disgust filled her usually playful eyes as she finally sat. He noticed the rings under her eyes as she glared at him from across the Plexiglas. He heard a sigh as she finally picked up the receiver.

"Hello, sunshine." His first words were sarcastic. A defensive mechanism that he can't even put away just this once. Nicky didn't react to the nickname. She's past caring, and, he suspects, unapologetic about what she thinks of him.

"Oh, hey, fuckwad." Her voice sounds the same. A relief, if nothing else was, and he nods in acknowledgement. A silent confirmation of her greeting, because for reasons he can't fathom, he's nervous. He convinces himself that the venom behind her words was always there; that he'd just not heard her voice in so long that things would be fuzzy. He's lying to himself and he knows it. Just like he knows any nuance in her voice. He's reminded of the time when she'd broken the only working fan in his possession when the heat wave had stuck. She'd promised to make it oscillate and make the whole room cooler - said that his teaching had taught her everything she needed to know. He'd asked her an hour later how things were going. He knew it'd be a hot, sweaty day the moment she'd smiled and said, "Fine!"

"Thanks for your sappy love letters." His tone betrayed his feelings as his voice wavered. She didn't seem phased as she raised her eyebrows and her stance remained defensive, arms crossed over her stomach.

"I wanted you to know I cared." Her own tone is flat, her voice raspy from years of drinking and smoking. He wonders how many drinks it would take to forget that he ever came today. Wondered if she knew _he_ cared.

"You know, in my family, 'fuck you' meant 'you really get me'. So joke's on you." He paused for a moment, watched her. His family really did act like that. He suspected her mother - from what he'd heard across the prison - barely said two words to her, let alone swearing to show affection.

Her voice cut his thoughts short. "What the fuck are you doin' here?"

Their back and forth continues for some time. Their words aren't particularly interesting to anyone but them, and even Nicky stared into the distance, bored of his voice. He doesn't know if it's tears or apathy in her eyes but doesn't want to consider the possibility that he'd made it worse when trying to clear his conscience.

Finally he worked up the nerve to ask her how she was. "Let's see. Uh, I'm sober. So that's something. All right, like, uh, intentionally sober. Not barely skating by sober - for the first time in my life." He raised his eyebrows. Prayed - because why not? - that this was the making of her like he'd imagined. She wasn't finished. "Um, hardest fucking thing I've ever done and oh, yeah - I picked a hell of a time to do it considering that anything you want down here is available to you and less than a foot away at practically all times." He felt his stomach drop and cursed whoever he'd prayed to. Not that he'd ever believed in any of that anyway. "Um, what else, what else? Let me catch you up." Her voice is like pure venom as she spat out her words. "I have no family. I am completely alone." The words felt like a slap in the face as she sobbed. The glass between them was almost a relief as he fought the urge to reach out to her. "I have no friends." Her voice caught but she tried to cover it up with a barked laugh. "And uh, yeah. Yeah. It's all my fault, so thank you for coming all the way down here and uh, reminding me of that while also managing to conveniently clear your own conscience, you know." She comes to a stand, pulling the phone wire taut. "I fucking really appreciate it!"

She slammed the phone down and hit the glass. He managed not to flinch but his heart pounded beneath his too small blue uniform as he watched her storm away. Head in his hands, he scraped back his hair and briefly wondered if it was her that caused his receding hairline. He conceded that it probably was as he stood, gave a perfunctory, tight lipped smile at the guard and slammed his own way out of the prison.

His visit had done nothing to ease his concerns - far from it. No, it had simply built more for him to worry over. But whatever she thought of him - and he knew plenty of words she'd use to describe him - he was going to find a way to get her out of this. Not for her - he didn't care for her that way. At least, that's what he told himself.

He was Joel Luschek and he didn't care about anything.

Certainly not the wild-haired lesbian junkie.

At least that's what he told himself.

 ** _I hope you liked this one. Most of the dialogue is from the actual show, just written down verbatim. But I wanted to show what was behind the words, and I hope I did a good job. Please leave a review telling me what you think. :)_**


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